Wakefield council’s cabinet has agreed to bankroll the £300,000 demolition of most of David Adjaye’s 10-year-old market hall because it believes the move will save money in the long term and be recoverable when the site is sold.

The city’s plans to shut the £3m structure and redevelop it as a leisure complex featuring a cinema and restaurants date back to 2014. Proposals by Leslie Jones Architects for the scheme – which would retain only the current market hall’s canopy – were approved at the end of last year.

Earlier this month Wakefield’s cabinet voted to pay for the demolition of the unwanted parts of the city centre building and reclaim the cost from developers Sovereign Centros and Orion Capital Partners, to whom the authority is planning to sell the site.

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